When disaster strikes, one of the biggest challenges facing responders is how to efficiently treat and track those injured. H. Allen Dobbs has made the modernization of the process a priority during his career and is now being recognized for his work.

Some departments are improving personnel practices around recruitment and knowledge management even in the face of pay freezes and criticisms of public servants. DHS created a higher education engagement group to bring in college students. GSA finds quality of applicants still strong. Senior leaders highlight successes during Public Service Recognition Week.

The Office of Personnel Management will convene an interagency workgroup in the coming weeks to establish governmentwide policies on domestic violence in the federal workplace. Rob Shriver, deputy general council for policy at OPM, has an update on the personnel agency's progress.

Increasingly, agencies are using a tool at their disposal. Instead of issuing RFP's, they're issuing challenges. And according to a new report from the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy, agencies that have jumped on the challenge bandwagon have begun to "reap the rewards of well-designed prizes integrated into a broader innovation strategy."

OMB controller Danny Werfel said the computer matching provisions in the Privacy Act make it harder for agencies to share information that would make stopping or finding waste, fraud and abuse easier. Senate lawmakers agreed they need to update the law to protect information but reduce the complexities.

The White House announced today President Barack Obama will appoint Todd Park to serve as the next federal chief technology officer. Park most recently served at the CTO of the Health and Human Services Department and fills the slot vacated by Aneesh Chopra, who stepped down last month after three years in the position.

The White House is taking a new step toward reducing duplicative government programs and reorganizing agencies. John Kamensky of the IBM Center for the Business of Government and Ira Shapiro, an international trade lawyer, give analysis on the recent administration proposals.

Private contractors that are supposed to guard against Medicare fraud paid claims submitted in the names of dead providers or for unnecessary medical treatments, which were among problems estimated to cost more than $1 billion in 2009, according to an inspector general report released Friday.

Without Congressional action, the public transit benefit that many federal employees use to take the subway, bus or vanpool to work will decrease on Jan. 1 from $230 to $125 per month. Feds said, for the most part, they'll continue to use mass transit even if it costs them more to get to work.